DR. WALLACE: I'm a girl and I have a twin brother. We are both 17 and we turn 18 in April of next year. What bugs me is that my father has a total double standard when it comes to our dating lives and curfews!

My brother and I are both good students and quite responsible in both our academic, athletic and social lives. I play on a sports team and even do volunteer work when I can on Saturday afternoons.

Yet my father is all over me to be home by 10 p.m. on weeknights and 11 p.m. on weekends, and I mean to the minute! If I'm five minutes late he's calling me, texting me and is ready to send out a search party.

Meanwhile, my twin brother regularly rolls in after 10:30 p.m. on weeknights and close to midnight on weekend evenings! I often go on dates at night with my boyfriend whereas my brother mainly hangs out with his teammates from the two sports he plays at our high school. He's dated a few girls off and on, but he does not have a steady girlfriend right now.

This seems to be the main difference with my father's so-called curfew "rules." It seems Dad is worried when I'm on a date and not so worried about my brother since Dad thinks he's only "hanging out with his buddies."

I think this is beyond unfair and want to hear your opinion on this matter. Since I know you worked for decades at high schools, I'm sure you're aware that both boys and girls can get into the same amount of "trouble" if they have enough time to cause it. I'm not saying my brother is going to cause any trouble, but I am saying that he does not deserve extra free time to "hang out" no matter who he's hanging out with. — One Frustrated Twin, via email

ONE FRUSTRATED TWIN: I agree with all aspects of your logic. In my opinion, your father is not only being unfair to you, but he's making a mistake here. Whatever time he has for a curfew for his 17-year-old teenagers should be applied uniformly and enforced equally.

A male teen and a female teen of the same age can both find themselves open to making poor decisions the later an evening rolls on, no matter their gender. By not enforcing his rules equally, he devalues his rules and erodes his authority. Yes, you are both minors and must acquiesce to his authority, but once you turn 18, you may become more likely to wish to escape a situation and a household that you deem is unfair to you.

He would be doing you, your brother and your entire household a favor by enforcing his rules fairly and uniformly. I suggest you request him to do so immediately.

I LOVE TO READ BUT HAVE NO ONE TO TALK TO ABOUT MY BOOKS

DR. WALLACE: I love reading, especially books that I enjoy. Some of them spark my imagination and inspire me to try new things, and cause me to look at myself and the world around me in a different way.

I think this is great, but my problem is that I have nobody at my school to talk to about the books I read. I often suggest some great books to my friends, but they never seem to have the time or interest to read any of them. In some cases, I've actually given the actual books to a few friends, but they always end up being returned to me eventually — without ever having been read at all.

Why is this? Am I the outlier here or are they? — I Love to Read, via email

I LOVE TO READ: Sadly, it appears to me that you are the outlier in this case. A recent study this summer by the National Assessment of Educational Progress has shown a troubling decline in reading scores of 13-year-olds.

One of the key results of this survey to me was the statistic that only 14% of students reported that they read for fun every day. This level is down from 17% in 2020 and 27% in 2012! This trend has been one-directional as over one-third of students read daily for fun back in the mid-1980s, for example.

Obviously, the rise of social media, the viewing of streaming videos and memes, and the large volume of text communications the average student sends and receives has cut dramatically into "free" time, and reading is one of the activities that has suffered.

I encourage you to keep reading and keep encouraging your friends to read as well. Find out what topics they truly enjoy and offer them books, magazines and stories from any source that you feel will fit their personalities well. You enjoy reading what you like, but your tastes might not match theirs.

Reading is a great activity and one that will serve you well over your lifetime. And for those high school students who look forward to becoming college students, the habit of practicing daily reading for an hour or two will really help future students when they reach their next educational level.

Dr. Robert Wallace welcomes questions from readers. Although he is unable to reply to all of them individually, he will answer as many as possible in this column. Email him at rwallace@thegreatestgift.com. To find out more about Dr. Robert Wallace and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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